


A Mouth-Filling Oath

by newredshoes



Category: Henry IV Part 1 - Shakespeare, The Hollow Crown (2012)
Genre: 1950s, Alternate Ending, Gangs, Gen, London, Married Couple
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-18
Updated: 2013-08-18
Packaged: 2017-12-23 22:33:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,063
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/931839
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/newredshoes/pseuds/newredshoes
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Is it a stain, to work for such a man as Bolingbroke? He more than acquitted himself in the Merchant Navy during the war. What man was it, then, sat behind his desk and told the Percy men how Lancaster would never line Welsh pockets? And what man is it that will labor with such a fellow?</p><p>Dock workers. Tottenham gangs. Post-war London. Not everyone's meant to make it out alive.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Mouth-Filling Oath

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Gileonnen](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Gileonnen/gifts).



You’ll hear about Harry Percy down at the local, all those Scotsmen’s teeth spat out on the floor. Broad shoulders, big swagger, that wife of his keeping the law. Fine family. Dad near ran the docks at Hull, came up same as Bolingbroke—by God, helped him up into shipping like he was God’s own gift to suits. Made the biggest man in London Town, he did. We all of us well remember that.

Still, that Hotspur doesn’t like London and makes no secret of it. Soon as he’s able he’s packing for up north and never coming back. There’s nothing he wants from this city, save that his wife is happy. But he does the job he’s born for; he keeps them docks in order and his men damn well love him for it. That and all them loose Scottish teeth.

Bolingbroke’s son, now they call him Prince Hal, the lanky, weedy, born-to-hang little scapegrace. His dad wants suits for him, but Prince Hal, he’ll have none of it, swilling all over Eastcheap with haggard meat pie ladies and red-faced old men. A lover, not a brawler—never seen him tried otherwise, have we? His dad hasn’t, at that, says he’d rather his wife had been young Hotspur’s mother, which the prince knows, even if it’s not in print.

That Prince Hal wants nothing from himself. He’ll take from the city, though, and laugh all the way to bed. Harry Percy doesn’t even like this city, but he knows that about the prince, knows it sure as a docker’s knot.

*

You know Kate Percy, don’t you? You’d know her if you saw her, got the Mortimer coloring and those big dark eyes. Still skinny from the war, like as not always will be. She runs her operation out of the flat on Warkworth Street, and it’s all her own doing. That’s her talent. Kate Percy, she’ll look after hers. Make friends if you do meet her, that’s the only advice there can be.

She’s raging of late, and no word on whether sooner her than him. The Welsh have her brother by the balls, as if there’s time to run off to Bangor and sort this mess out in person. Edmund Mortimer, fine fellow, as honest as they come. By his talents and hers, you’d hardly know they share blood, unless you stood them next to each other. Pity about blood sometimes: Edmund’s debts are his, her father says, and Kate rails about him still, too proud to say he can’t put up for his own son.

“You’re still owed,” she says to her husband one night as they share a bit of drink. “Were you ever paid for that work up at Holmedon?”

He doesn’t set his bottle down, nor quite meet her eye. “Kate,” he says, in that Geordie rumble of his, “that’s baby money.”

She swirls her bottle by the neck. “Yes, and when we have a baby, we’ll be very glad we once could give it up.”

There could be money, if Edmund would take from her. But he’ll not, and she’ll not ask around. Her family is her business. She’s learned that long since.

Glendower, though, of all people. It had to be Owen Glendower.

Harry furrows his foreman’s brow deep. “Payroll says it’s meant to come next Friday.” He knows that money is already gone, soon as she spoke it. There’d be no living with himself or with her if anything happened to Edmund, rot his eyes.

Kate, she doesn’t smile, but she straightens in her shoulders, and she sets her forearms against the table, and they both of them know it’s good money easily got again. Harry Percy can walk into any carpeted office any time he likes. This could be a fight, but it needn’t be. God bless, for once, for them, it’s not.

*

It’s Harry’s father and his uncle bring him home the next night. Harry has no drink in him. It’s that clear-eyed fury that sends him stalking and snarling up and down the streets and steps. Kate stares at Thomas Percy the union man, grim with his hands folded on her front step, as Henry Percy grabs for his son and tries as he can to still him.

“He won’t give any money that’ll go to Glendower’s pocket,” Thomas says.

Kate gapes. “He has say now in how we use what’s owed us?”

Thomas bows his head. “Penny-wise and pound-foolish, as ever. Same as when Richard came down.”

Kate, oh, the corners of her mouth go tight, and she steps off the stoop toward her husband, who’s still yelling. “You can go,” she says to Henry. “Your brother too.”

Her father-in-law holds up his palms. “Have your joy of him tonight.”

The Percy brothers are gone soon enough with the look she gives him. Sharp as falling off a roof, Harry goes quiet, rubbing his temples while his shoulders shake. Kate knows better than to touch him now. She white-knuckles her own elbows, though. She could use him herself.

“Not in the street, Harry, for Christ’s sake,” she says calmly.

“I’ll have them in the streets for how he’s treating us,” he growls, and he can barely open his mouth, with his jaw so tight.

“You’ll be the bigger man and come inside. Come on, everyone can see.”

“Why should they not?” No hoarseness will keep him quiet now. He’s back to waving his arms, cycling up into motion again. “Why should we protect that ungrateful, cold-bellied—!”

 _“Harry.”_ She grabs his wrists, she holds him still, she forces him to look at her, Kate Percy. He’s a big man, a strong man. He battles ropes and cargo and other big men for all hours. But he can’t shake her off, and he looks her in the eye when she takes his face in her hands.

“You haven’t failed at anything,” she says, that lion-tamer.

Harry Hotspur, can't even trust his wife, he's so sick and angry.

*

They don’t even fight after. Harry lies next to Kate in their bed, both their bodies hard and heavy. Oh, he wants sleep, he wants to slip out from the crush of this rage, but it’s curdling his blood, it’s pounding through every inch of him, it’s bearing down on his heart and he’ll never outrun it. Kate ought to teach him—she knows cold, calculating furies, she knows how to bide her time and right wrongs her own way.

Is it a stain, to work for such a man as Bolingbroke? He more than acquitted himself in the Merchant Navy during the war. We all of us well remember that. What man was it, then, sat behind his desk and told the Percy men how Lancaster would never line Welsh pockets? What man is it that will labor with such a fellow, with his own wife’s brother caught by Owen Glendower?

Harry only thinks to have a bit of a smoke, maybe rouse Kate, a little late-night relief. It’s all them early mornings: his hands just go for his boots and take the jacket off its hook. A smoke and a walk, then. Seems fair and right.

Three hours later and Kate, for his sins, wakes to a cold bed, an unlocked door. He’s propelled right through the small hours, down the high street and out of Tottenham. Not a glance or a word for the working girls, or the drunks or the grocers or the strays. Not a thought for the dark windows: the tobacconists, the dressmakers, the bookies, the fronts. Harry Percy has his uncle at one ear and his father at the other. 

All those true colors Bolingbroke’s shown through the years. It can’t be denied. The union’s got records on records.

And now for that question, now that he lets himself—what sort of man fathers a Prince Hal? Harry’s seen the East End and who goes there. He’s fetched the trifler from those pubs himself, at Bolingbroke’s request. What’s that? What proof is the son?

The walking should steady him, let off some steam. It’s movement he needs, it’s why he’s out climbing and hauling and plugging holes with men and crates. If he wanted to learn, he could himself be a union man. The union could use him when the suits grip too tight, but no. He wore a tie once, and only then because of Kate’s white dress. That yesterday he stood still as long as he did, that was dismay, and then fury. But there’s no shaking what’s in him here. He’s as wracked as a saint, that man. Our Fellow of Wronged Wrath.

All the quays know what happened, every hand. They’d have known even without Hotspur roaring all the night before. All hands got to muttering too. If that’s how Bolingbroke treats the best of us, what hope have we? To see Percy stand there, then, before the gates—who wouldn’t wonder? Would you not have stopped to watch?

You’d not see its like on stage or on screen. Say many things about that Harry Percy, but he’s not made of artifice enough to fill a pigeon’s brainpan. So when he turns and puts the docks at his back without a word to anyone, why, that’s not like him at all, save that it’s all that he could do. His great charger of a heart, there's no other choice.

Well, now. Dockers and suits, we all of us must see that.

*

The cold bed and the unlocked door don’t surprise her. Kate’s glad of it. The air stills. Harry being out of the house lets her stand down, take stock. First she tends to the flat, makes the bed, does some dishes, washes the floors. By nine o’clock she’s easy in her skin again. She slips out the front door, lights a cigarette, sucks it down sitting on the stoop. Fine blue clear morning it is. The bustle doesn’t reach them here on Warkworth Street. It’s Harry likes that, not her.

Any other sister could raise a stink. She’d go to the papers and wet her eyes and ruin her makeup just enough. Ah, that idiot brother, run foul of the biggest family business west of Liverpool! Everyone’s got one. You know what they say about Owen Glendower, the bodies that wash up along the coast unmanned. And Lancaster withholding honest back pay, all for that he’s willing to let her own blood rot. Someone could hold a church dinner, sell some tea cozies—a fete for Edmund Mortimer.

Kate exhales, muses, looks up and down the street. She grinds the stub against the side of the stoop, out of sight, and drops the butt in her coffee can what’s tucked behind the steps.

“Don’t be shy, Gilliams, it’s not becoming.”

The Teddy boy is new-minted. Baby fat still in his face, too much grease in his hair, but he’ll fill out and be handsome, if he keeps out of fistfights. Kate likes the lad himself, but they’re trouble she doesn’t want. Youth gets in the way. But she’s known him, even before the rolled-up jean cuffs and the cheap tailored jacket and the banjo strung with twine upside-down across his scrawny shoulders. Kate gives him a smile, and he returns it, all cheer, with one side of his mouth.

She nods at the banjo. “What’s that skiffle nonsense?”

Gilliams, he’s indignant. “I can play it.” He waits on her nod: her eyebrows go up, and he swings the instrument around front with more style than practice. She can’t say she recognizes the tune, but that’s a gallant attempt.

“Look at Lonnie Donegan here.”

He tries not to look too pleased, with long odds on winning. He squeezes the banjo’s neck. “I’m checking in for Seven Sisters, ma’am.”

“There’s a good lad. Nothing else to say?”

The Teddy boy shakes his head. Kate narrows her eyes.

“You seen the Yorkshireman about, Bishop?”

He shifts on his feet. “I’ve not, ma’am. How quick d’you want him?” Kate glances down. Those shoes are too small for him; she takes a guess at his size and makes a note to herself. 

She shakes her head. “Tell your people. It’ll sort itself out.” Another smile. “Thanks, Gilliams.”

He grins, and fumbles the banjo back over his shoulder. “Good morning, ma’am.”

“Keep your nose clean,” she calls after him, and he turns to wave as he’s walking off. Kate gets to her feet, watches him go, considers another cigarette.

God’s blood. Shit. It’s Harry likes the quiet, not her.

*

He’s close enough to home, but Harry’s feet bring him to his father’s house first. He must talk with Kate, but his father will have advice too. His uncle is there, when Harry’s dad leads him into the kitchen. Thomas Percy seems pleased to see him, rumpled and footsore as he is.

“I’ll not go back,” Harry says, and immediately Thomas says, “No, of course not.”

“You mustn’t,” says Henry Percy. “Not if there’s to be a strike.”

Harry, that stops him. “How long has this been on the table?”

“You know Bolingbroke, Harry,” says Thomas. “It was only a matter of time before he gave us cause.”

“So the cause might as well have been me?”

“Sit down, son.” Henry sets both palms on the tabletop, and waits for him to comply. “Word’s out, Harry. Men are going to start coming to you. They’ll tell you they want to follow you, or turn you aside. You must know who to listen to.”

He scoffs before the sentence is done. “Whose son are you speaking to? I’ve no thought of giving over.”

“Harry.” Thomas hunches over the table, arms propped wide and stiff. “It shouldn’t need saying, but I will. You mustn’t involve Kate.”

At that, Harry leans back in his chair. His right hand drops to his side, his left drums the tablecloth. “Kate’s business is to look after us.”

Henry, all reason. “We must keep this clean, Harry. It’s really none of her concern. This is quayside stuff, far from the home front.”

“I can trust my wife,” Harry snaps.

“It’s not about trust,” says Thomas the union man. “This goes big, and it will—we’ve no case if the public sees her hand in it. Let’s count our blessings that she’s respectable and discreet in the first place.”

“Let the strike do its work,” Henry says, before Harry can leap to his feet. “Bolingbroke will come down quick enough.”

That gives our Hotspur pause. “You think so?”

Thomas winks. “We’ve done this before.”

Harry takes the long way home, but he’s still early, for him. Kate’s bringing the washing in; he’s caught her busy. She sets down the basket and stands there, across the living room.

“Heard you walked out.”

He sees her again, her quick dark eyes, her freckles, her clever hands. The anger steps aside, and it’s a relief, it’s such a blessed relief. “I never walked in.”

That line between her brows. “Harry.”

“Let’s not for an hour.” He shakes his head and comes closer. “I could use an hour.”

“I could use a hand,” she says archly. He can see it in her too, weighing her options. “Wash up and help me finish these,” she says. “I wouldn’t mind an hour myself.”

*

The wet docks turn away the ships, the biggest ones in the biggest port, and all the nation takes note. Walter Blunt from the Lancaster Line says Bolingbroke will hear none of it. The union lays out its list, says that Bolingbroke knows the nature of their grievances, and it’s time the rest of England did too. The dockers do it for Harry Percy, the finest among them. That’s no way to treat any man.

Ten thousand working hours in hands lost, if this keeps up. Britain ought to know the price of all its goods.

*

He comes home smelling different now, her Harry. No more the silty undertones of river water and hemp, and no more the nip of extra special bitter and American cigarettes. These days he’s in and out all hours, and he’ll say “Meetings, talks, other angry men,” but now he’ll smell of the train station, or racetracks, or industrial smoke; once, even, of a sweet field, somehow worst of all. Kate sleeps next to him, she washes his clothes, she rakes his back and she screams back at him, but still his cheeks grow rougher, his eyes darker, his sidestepping more snappish.

“Don’t make me,” she cries in fury one night. “Harry, I’ll not have you followed. Don’t force my hand.”

“Don’t you threaten me, then!” he snarls.

“Don’t you trust me?” She grabs for him; she’ll hurt him if it makes him mark her. “Don’t you trust me, love, to do what’s best and right?”

“I cannot even love you until you let me to my work,” he shouts, and Kate goes pale, with grief, with rage.

“Something’s made you say that,” she says. She pulls away; she’s shaking.

Harry sighs hotly, and makes for the hall, his head bowed. He won’t look at her. Kate trusts herself around him not at all, so she leaves him. The big radio in the sitting room, she’ll chase him off with that.

Nice smooth BBC voice crackles in, reeling off the day’s headlines. Kate settles into her chair, heart galloping, and stares at their framed pictures while the broadcast drones on. At Brighton. At Alnwick. At Usk. At the chapel after all.

The front door slams: off he goes, then. Kate sets her jaw and begins making lists in her head.

Their telephone rings. Kate blinks and frowns at it. She’s not expecting any calls. Not a word from Edmund, even, these past several days. It’s highly irregular. She has to cross the room to pick it up.

“Oh, good, so glad it’s you I caught,” says the voice on the other end, a man. “Kate Mortimer, by God, how are you?”

“It’s Percy,” she says sharply. “Who is this?”

“Apologies,” the voice says. It’s slick and graceful, full of life and subtlety. “It’s Hal, Kate. I know it’s been years, but—this is Hal.”

*

Kate, she can hardly believe it, and she says so. “Bolingbroke?”

“Same song, different verse.”

In the background: shouts and cheers, muffled. “Where’re you calling me from?”

“The phone box, outside my local.”

She can see him, all lines and misspent grace, lounging in a booth somewhere in Cheapside.

“You’re suits, Hal. Suits don’t have a local, that’s not how it works.”

“Maybe it won’t always be like that.”

She furrows her brow deeper. “What do you want?”

“Just a social call, honest. A friendly one.” He pauses: she bets he hasn’t closed his mouth. “How’s your husband sleeping?”

“What the hell kind of question is that?”

“I didn’t think so.”

She closes her eyes, centers herself again. “I’m not sure why you’re trying to provoke me.”

“I’d have thought you’d find it charming. Ah well, we all miscalculate from time to time.”

“I’m going to hang up.” She pulls the receiver away from her ear.

“Wait, wait!” His voice hums out of the earpiece. “I’d like to help you. Harry, actually, but also you.”

All her sirens go off inside. She stays still. “How’s that?”

“Not like this. In person.”

“Careful, Hal.”

He laughs softly, and it sets the hairs up at the back of her neck. “Fair enough. I’m of the people, Kate. Find me when you will.”

He hangs up on her. Two minutes, if that, end to end.

Kate sits there with the radio and glares hard at her pictures, thinking.

*

You should see him down at the docks, with all those hard men, his boys. There they all swarm, blocking the gate, aggressively idle, in full view of the head office. There goes Harry Hotspur among them, slapping backs and roaring his thanks from atop any high place he can climb. God, don’t they love him, how he makes this about honor. Them suits don’t respect us. By God, they forget what we can do!

It’s Harry makes the trip to Douglas Dock, without being told. He knows the force of anger, of old fights. You can turn those to anything if you’ve half a mind. All those Scotsmen know exactly who he is. Only one gets a punch in before Northumberland’s finest fends them off. He comes to Archibald with purpled ribs, but ah, you should see it: a few days of this and there’s Scots joining the picket line. Even Thomas gives him credit for it. See, then, what fury can make?

Bolingbroke thunders on the radio, how the union is endangering the industry, how a selfish act is keeping Britons from their goods, how rationing could be just around the corner if this keeps up. He calls on Mr. Percy to end this grandstanding and salvage a lot of good men’s jobs.

From the gates, Harry roars, “Come and stop me!” and all them dockers roar with him.

*

It’s Kate who sets her fork down first. “To Bangor?”

“Yes, I think we should both go.” Harry loves a good shepherd’s pie, and he keeps shoveling hers in. She hasn’t seen him this guileless in a dog’s age. “We’re striking for him, aren’t we? Only fair that we should check in.”

He means to set her off by this. Instead, she works on warming to the idea. “I’ve got my backups in place,” she says. “I was going to catch the 8:30 at Euston.”

“We’ll pack for two, then.” He smiles. “I’ve never been to Wales.”

“Who’s doing duty down at the docks?”

“My father and uncle will take care of it,” he says, at ease. “A man needs some time with his wife.”

Kate, she smiles back, that little half-crook that could mean anything. “So derelict, Harry Percy.”

He’s scraping his pot clean. “I’m certain it’ll be worth our while.”

Off they go, then, husband and wife on the early train out west. They even pay for a private car that Harry jokes they should make use of. Kate swats him away—she’s distracted, she is. They switch at Birmingham, and now they’re off the grid, now all she has is rehearsing what she’ll say to Edmund.

Bangor’s a little city, mountains and the strait and a long pier of its own. It’s not much of a walk from the station, and they’re glad of the chance to stretch their legs.

Who is there but a landlady at her brother’s last address? “Oh no,” she says, squinting between them. “He’s not been here a fortnight, maybe.”

Oh, the looks on their faces when she tells them where to find him.

*

Catrin, she’s a pretty thing, red-gold hair and quick eyes. She and Edmund, you couldn’t get a paper knife between them, she hangs on him so.

“No, he’s not at all like they say he is back home,” Edmund says, bright-eyed as you like, walking them through the guest wing of Glendower’s princely estate. “A real businessman, a genius, really. He’s been teaching me loads of stuff.”

“Gone and replaced our dad, have you?” Kate, she’s keeping steady and cool for show.

Edmund, though, he’s all smiles, especially when Catrin catches his eye again. “I can’t really be mad at him. I mean, I was, yeah, but…” He leans into his new wife. “This is the best thing that’s happened to me.”

Catrin breaks in, a stream of accented English so strong that none of them, not Harry nor Kate nor Edmund himself, catch one of seven words. Edmund just laughs, like he can’t believe his luck, and beams. Catrin blushes.

“I’d never have seen what’s been under my nose if not for your uncle, Harry. You thank him for me when you get back to London.”

Harry laughs himself, though Kate sees it, a stumble. “My uncle?”

Edmund rolls his eyes. “I’m such a dunce about women. He’s the one that saw Catrin liked me. I’d have never talked to her on my own.” He and she exchange more fond looks; she wraps one arm about his waist and giggles. “Good thing, too, I’ve never been happier,” he says, grinning full out. “I knew I was right to envy you two! Love really is just like that.”

“Is this the room?” Kate crinkles her eyes at Catrin, who watches back with more cleverness than she wants to show. “Long trip for us, I’m afraid. Dinner in an hour, then?”

“Yeah, yeah.” Edmund’s giddy as a puppy. “Just wait until you meet Owen—I think you’ll like him, Harry.”

Kate doesn’t see the newlyweds offs. “Owen Glendower,” she says when she’s put the door between them. “Who would have thought?”

Harry, he’s already pacing. “I can’t be here.”

“I know.”

He’s breathing hard too. “Kate, what’s going on?”

“Why, Harry Percy’s in the belly of the beast,” she deadpans. “It’s a rescue mission.”

“No.” He’s roiling with that nervous energy again. “No, my uncle would never—” He stops himself, but Kate sees that guilty look. He can’t hide a thing from her, in the end.

She’s got her eyes hooded; she’s mulling, gnawing. “Why would Thomas have come to Glendower?”

“Why should Edmund have married in!” Harry throws both arms up, then sets them on his hips, then gets to pacing again. He’s impossible to watch. “When was he going to tell us, hm? Why would a man fail to mention that he’s signed on with a crime family?”

Kate tilts her head. “How high is that horse, from where you’re sitting?”

He scoffs. “Come on, this is different. We always knew. And I’ve never cared.”

“Very noble-hearted of you.” She’s eyeing him, though. “What’s got you in knots, Harry? His debt’s paid. You’re free to focus on Bolingbroke now.”

He sits down. Harry never sits down. He presses his back against the wall. He looks trapped. Kate doesn’t go to him. He needs to feel trapped a little more.

“I’ve not been forthright with you, Kate,” he says finally, like he’s admitting to a murder.

“I’ve noticed.”

He leans forward, elbows on his knees, and bows his head. “We want Bolingbroke out, of course we do,” he says. His fingers rake through his russet hair. “My father and uncle, they’ve—done this before, they know.”

“Tender feelings for old Richard, now?”

Harry sits up. His face, it’s a plea, so Kate relents and settles in beside him. “It’s Edmund,” he says quietly. “It’s Edmund they’ve chosen.”

“To head up Lancaster?” She goes very still at then. Then: “What does he know about shipping?”

“He’s a quick study!” Harry looks away. “And he’s a good man. Everyone knows what a good man he is.”

“And he’s not in my business. He’s made a point of it.” Her eyes are no harbor. “That’s what you couldn’t tell me?”

“I’m sorry,” he says, and it’s in his voice. “I was led to understand that—when this got big…”

She doesn’t look away. “That I couldn’t interfere. Not with what I don’t know.”

Harry, he’s humbled, he’s shamed. He needs no help from her. “They’ve done it before,” he says, like it’s an answer. “It sounded best.”

“Well, haven’t you fucked up.”

All repentance gone, he glares at her. “And how are you so calm?”

“Because I know you’ll make it up to me.” She brushes his hair, shaggier and messier than it’s ever been, away from his forehead. “I didn’t look into it, Harry. As a matter of trust.”

She casts about the room. A telephone for the guests, very fancy. Owen Glendower spares no expense.

This is a very neat corner they’re in. Kate kisses Harry’s broad shoulder. “Give me a moment. I’m going to make a call.”

Harry frowns. “To who?”

“Not one of my people.”

“Kate.”

“No.” She pats his knee. “Just keep your voice down.”

*

He must be primed. A whole night with that glutted, officious Welshman and his wet blanket daughter and Edmund mooning like a calf over both of them. Thank God they catch the earliest train they could, though it means a change at Shrewsbury and they don’t reach London until teatime. Harry stews and stews and stews, and caged up in that car, oh but he’s a tinderbox.

Kate has an address, a coffee bar near a Tube stop they’ve neither of them been off. It’s here Harry’s reminded how much he hates London: nothing here but kids with beards and guitars, and they’ve never worked a day in their lives. Kate looks impeccable, even a little hip with her nice blouse and slim trousers. Harry’s felt less working class in Lancaster’s plush carpet office.

So when he sees him there, all sleek and rumpled and pleased with himself, with his oxblood jacket and his newspaper and his miniscule cup of Italian nonsense—why, by God, if he showed up like that at Harry’s local—!

Kate’s already on her way, oh lads, with that deadly sway in her step. “This your idea of a joke?” she says, and Prince Hal, he turns and stands right up.

“Of course not,” he says, with a blue-ribbon smile, and gestures to the booth. “Who’d recognize us here?”

Harry, he doesn’t say a thing, though he’s as stiff-legged as a dog. Hal takes a step toward him, holds out his hand, but Harry won’t touch him. He takes his place by his wife. Hal folds himself back into his seat.

“Thank you for trusting me.”

“We don’t trust you,” says Kate. “But let’s hear you out.” The attendant comes around, and Kate orders whatever Hal’s having. Harry just shakes his head, glowering across the table.

“How’s our Mrs. Mortimer?” Hal asks.

“Who would you mean by that?” barks Harry, and Kate’s jaw tightens.

Hal looks from husband to wife. “I know enough to help you,” he says. “You don’t have to take my word for it. But I’d like you to hear me out.”

“Why?”

Kate hisses her husband’s name at him. The attendant comes and sets down a cup and saucer; Kate’s all politeness at her. It even reaches her eyes.

Harry leans forward. “No, I’d like to know why we’re entertaining any kind of notion about taking the word of a do-nothing lout who was born no higher than you or me.”

“Your point’s a fair one,” Hal says, not a hint of merriment in his face. He looks like Bolingbroke when he’s like this—how careworn the old man’s been of late. “I know how little you think of me, Percy, and I’ve not given you much cause to think otherwise. You’ve got whole cities singing your praises, and my father always spoke of your goodwill as the greatest part of his wealth.”

It’s like the shop’s not even there. “What’s next, then?” Harry’s voice, it’s gone soft. “You going to sing me a song?”

“Are you listening? I want to help you. Your family’s thrown its weight behind Mortimer, correct?”

“My father has,” he says. “And my uncle.” Kate’s face twitches. She sips her coffee.

Hal glances between them again. “You know a Yorkshireman named Bishop?”

“Kate’s mole at the docks? I do. —Come, love, of course I did,” he murmurs, with no rancor.

“He’s been to see my brother,” says Hal.

Now it’s Kate’s turn to look sharp. “Has he?”

Hal folds his hands, those piano-player fingers. “I know you got the Douglas Dock to join your picket,” he says, pressing. “And Glendower’s behind you too.”

“I don’t want Glendower’s help,” Harry snaps. “That wasn’t my doing.”

“No. I know. But he’s in your roster all the same. And the people are going to know it, and that will sink your good name, see if it won’t.”

Harry’s grim. He’s silent.

“What’s this about Bishop?” Kate asks. She’s gripping that little white cup.

“He came to my brother John with an offer.” Hal glances at her. “From Thomas Percy.”

She frowns. “What sort of offer?”

“Kate,” says Harry quietly. “You know.”

None of them say anything for a minute there.

Harry, he sits back, he sets them blue eyes on Prince Hal. He juts his chin out. “What do you want out of me, then?”

“Let me come to the docks with you.” Hal’s earnest. “I want you and your men to get to know me.”

“Join the picket? So they’ll love you?” Harry laughs.

Hal doesn’t. “My father thinks about as much of me as you do,” he says, and it’s not resignation in his voice. “I know what he respects. This way we all get what we want.”

Harry hears it. Kate too, to be sure. “Seems we have lots to talk about,” she says. “We’ll send word when we’re ready.”

“Not too long,” says Hal. “I don’t think this strike has been kind to my father.”

“When we’re ready,” says Harry, and Hal, he hears it. He just nods.

*

“He’s playing us,” she says once they’re back on the Tube. She leans into his shoulder. He puts his callused hand on hers.

“Of course,” he says. It’s several stops before he speaks again.

“I don’t know who I hate more,” Harry Percy says.

*

Little Butler passes her on the street. “Evening, ma’am,” she says, and Kate, she does the gracious thing and pauses.

“All right, Butler?”

“I was coming to see you, actually. Some trouble up around Tewkesbury Road.”

“Is it bigger or smaller than what’s down at the Docklands?”

“…Smaller, ma’am.”

“Get Eddie and Rich on it. You know where to find them?”

A nod.

Kate smiles. “Good girl. I’ll check in on it soon. Thanks, Butler.”

She saunters off. “Say hi to your mister from us! We’re all of us cheering him on.”

Kate reaches her in-laws’ just as the sun is setting. “We’d have saved you some supper if we’d known you were calling!” says Margaret Percy as she welcomes her in. “Harry coming too?”

Kate hangs her jacket herself. “No, he’s asleep already. Early riser and all.”

“Don’t I know that,” says Margaret, eyebrows raised. Henry Percy’s heard their voices, and he comes out from the kitchen, all cheer. Kate kisses him on the cheek, the daughter they were glad to gain, and joins the both of them for a cuppa.

“How’re the lads?” she asks, stirring her cream and sugar.

Henry’s got awful teeth, half a head of ram’s curls, flyaway eyebrows. Kate sometimes likes looking at him, to study how Harry will look when they’re older. “Oh, as full of fight as ever,” he’s saying. “Walter Blunt’s been by again, on his knees to negotiate, but we’re having none of him.”

“So it’s likely to go on longer?”

“Oh, I’m not so sure of that.” Henry looks a bit smug. “Rumor has it Bolingbroke’s had doctors in and out.”

“Your old friend, Henry?” says Margaret, disapproving.

He snorts. “He took care of that himself, as we all know!”

Margaret’s been up to her ears in all this, and she’s done with it. She offers Kate the sugar cubes again. “Heard you two went away.”

“Yes, to see my brother,” says Kate, holding up a hand. She sighs. “I’m afraid he’s gone and done a very stupid thing.”

“What, again?” says Margaret, and Henry chuckles.

“My brother,” says Kate, “has gotten married!”

“What! When?”

“Last week, or so he told us. To Owen Glendower’s daughter.”

Henry’s bushy eyebrows have shot up to where his hairline was. “That’s one way to pay off a debt, I suppose.”

“Yes, well, Owen Glendower being what he is, I’ve been terribly worried what it means for the strike. I’m amazed no one’s caught wind of it yet, but someone will find the banns sooner or later.” She stirs her tea with the little spoon and smiles. “But I’m afraid there’s no changing his mind. He’s done it for love, you see.”

“Well, but look at you,” says Margaret, matter-of-fact. “You were the best that ever happened to our Harry.”

“Thank you.” Her smile’s very white. “I know what Edmund’s feeling right now, truthfully. I still feel it. I love Harry more than breath. If something tried to come between us, I don’t know what I might do.”

Henry Percy says nothing, only those eyebrows, he’s drawn them together.

Kate settles back into the sofa. “Well, I’m sure Edmund will thrive wherever he lands. He even spoke of coming to London soon.”

“Did he?” says Henry, and did you hear it? That little crack in his voice? “It would be nice to see him down here.”

“Yes, I wouldn’t mind having him close.” She laughs. “Someone needs to look after him, and Catrin’s all calf-love still.”

Margaret protests with a funny old story of her early wedded years. Kate sits all attention, watching Henry and interjecting just when she’s supposed to. Henry, he’s gone a little pale. Kate will never live to see Harry look on her so.

“You’ve always been so good to me,” she says when Margaret Percy hugs her goodbye. “Thank you,” she says, truthfully, and gives Henry’s wife a squeeze.

*

Even before sunup, everyone’s there, all ten thousand man-hours lost, passing the thermos ‘round. We’ll be saying for years what we thought to see Prince Hal trailing our Hotspur toward the quay. You saw him in the paper, or heard about him from East Enders, but you never got the real measure of him, that he was so tall or that watchful look he wore or that he didn’t walk like a lout, not a bit.

Thomas Percy, he spots them right off. There’s an angry version of the Geordie swagger, and it’s proof that Thomas and Harry are family. Harry doesn’t so much as give him a nod until the man is nose to nose.

“What’s the meaning of this?”

“Good morning, uncle,” Harry says, and it’s the most dangerous blithe you’ve ever heard now and since.

Hal tries to step forward. He holds out his hand, like a respectable man. “Mr. Percy, if I might—”

“Begging your pardon, but I know quite well who you are.” Thomas Percy leans closer at his nephew. “What’s this suit doing, following you here?”

“Prince Hal? He’s here with me.” Harry presses past him. All the men are watching.

Thomas grabs him by the jacket, and oh, we all see that he’s got the lion by the tail. “This is not the plan we had,” he snarls.

“Remind me, then.” Harry, his eyes blaze but he doesn’t raise his voice. “Which parts am I forgetting, uncle? I think it’s somewhere between sinking Edmund with his Glendower wife, with me and mine tied to him, and you pulling little Duke John’s strings after Bolingbroke’s gone. Is that the span of the matter?”

Thomas opens his mouth, but Harry just pats him on the shoulder and strides on.

“How are we, my lads?” he bellows, and his men roar back. Harry’s not the biggest man on the line, but by God, they all listen. Harry Percy would do anything for them. They’d follow his good name anywhere.

“You know what they say about family,” he crows. “No one hates you like the ones you know best.” He nods into the crowd. “You’ve got eyes in your heads. You see Bolingbroke’s son here. You want to know where I’ve been? Give him a listen.”

All those dockers, those Scotsmen too, they give Prince Hal the floor, out of respect for their foreman. Harry Percy’s watching him closest of all.

What Hal says—ah, why would you look to Thomas Percy then? The prince is too stirring, too honest, too true to pay much heed to one man slipping off. Why note such a little absence, when you’re counted as witness to this other, finer transformation?

*

The whole thing crumbles: it’s only a few days from that to this. Bolingbroke, next you know he’s abed in a hospital, though all the press hear he’s just being kept comfortable. Prince Hal ascends. The trustees crown him, and the port opens up again. An old, red-faced man shows up at the dockyard gates, demanding an audience, a foreman’s pay, but Hal says he doesn’t know him, and security hauls him off.

Henry Percy, someone saw him board a Durham train at King’s Cross. Perhaps a sudden interest in working Hull again. Don’t ask young Hotspur. He’s not seen the man and he hasn’t gone looking. Other things occupy him these days, ropes for his hands and holes in the union to plug.

Kate Percy arrives at the head office in gloves and a skirt. Hal offers her a beverage, anything she likes. His suit is Savile Row, beautifully cut. He’s cleared the desk already, and he’s midway through the walls and shelves. Kate won’t take a thing from him.

“How long do you think to keep me by the balls, Hal?”

Hal’s mouth twists, and he cants his head. “We’re both of us grateful to each other, Kate. We saved each other’s skin. That makes us friends.”

She lets nothing onto her face. “He was always going to die soon. You don’t make friends with me and mine if you’re not going somewhere. Are you ready for that?”

He lets the pause swell and bloom. “I know how Whitehall works,” he says.

Kate snorts. “I’m sure you do.” She rises to her feet; he does the same.

“Give my best to Harry,” he says. “I’d like to see him again soon.”

She promises nothing as she shuts the door behind her. Down the stairs, out the front gate, off through the streets, to the Tube. She stops at a newsstand on the way; a headline catches her eye. She pays her three-halfpence for it and brings it on her train.

The Met can’t say what happened to Thomas Percy. If there’s any evidence worth a damn, it’s washed off in the river. Kate sits with the rest of the broadsheet, scanning business here, foreign affairs there. She leaves the paper on the seat beside her for the next person to find. She’s making lists in her head, doctors to visit, questions to ask, but for now she’s headed up aboveground, back home to Warkworth Street, to that husband of hers she loves, sure as a docker’s knot.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you, Gileonnen, for asking for a plotty Hotspur AU — I don't know how this one happened, but I couldn't be happier that it did. Infinite thanks to A, B, B and G, who helped immeasurably along the way.
> 
> No _On the Waterfront_ was harmed in the making of this fic.


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